"A Song of Seas and Power: The flow of labor, goods and currents"
Exhibition Date: 2021/12/11-2022/4/10
Exhibition Venue: Gallery 302, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts
Curator: Iris Shu-Ping HUANG, Chief Curator, Exhibition Department

=========================================================

For China, Taiwan sits on the periphery of the central plains and is centrally positioned for strategic maritime warfare. Taiwan’s relationship to the world hinges on the ocean, whether in the logistical supply chain of commerce, in the battleground for resources and military competitiveness, in the path for linguistical and cultural transmission, or on the route for immigration and migrant labor. Via the sea, all of these factors contribute to the appearance of Taiwan’s ecology in the global context.

The title of this exhibition, “A Song of Seas and Power”, there is an allusion to the Chinese language idiom “Jhu Lu Jhong Yuan” (lit. “In pursuit of deer on the central plains,” meaning a battle for the throne), and an implied pivot from the Zhongyuan culture as the seat of power to re-contemplate Taiwan’s cultural context and narrative in the oceanic cartography. With the title “A Song of seas and power: the flow of labor, goods, and currents”, the exhibition breaks away from the discourses of environmental protection where the ocean is part of the natural ecological cycle and shifts the attention onto the movements of “goods,” “people,” and “cultures,” in the historical and economic trends of global connection resulted from the impacts and influences of global economy, politics, and capitalism on the island of Taiwan brought by the ocean, ultimately exploring the often neglected and suppressed ethics of human nature, spiritual values, as well as the issues of labor and human rights that have rarely attracted much attention in the competitions throughout the structural changes across different eras.

The current exhibition features these works by seven contemporary artists: YANG Mao-Lin, HSU Chia-Wei, CHEN Chieh-Jen, LU YU-Jui, LIN Guan-Ming and the Indonesian artists Irwan Ahmett & Tita Salina, the unearthed relics of Fort Zeelandia from Tainan Municipal Administration of Culture Heritage, as well as pieces from the collections of the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts (NTMoFA): including a print from the Qing Dynasty Pacification of Taiwan series that depicts the Ling Shuangwen incident (Note 6), and image works created by Indonesian artists on human rights issues of migrant workers in Taiwan commissioned by the NTMoFA for the Asian Art Biennial. The exhibited works take different perspectives in outlining paths of movement for Taiwan’s goods and culture in the tides of history, and in describing the impact from changing political power dynamics and the economic industry. The content of these works touches on Taiwan’s role as an Asian financial and commercial hub during the 17^th century; and the fierce competition for maritime trade and commercial rights for. Ruled by different regimes from the 18^th to 20^th centuries, Taiwan’s pivotal role in the maritime context, linking external geopolitics and economies, became increasingly prominent whether in politics, military, commerce, finance, or transportation. The current exhibition weaves together Taiwan’s history, culture, and people in a world history connected by the development of maritime transportation and in the global economic context. It is an attempt to seek out ways in which the coordinates of an island on the fringes can be located in the midst of intense global competition, as well as to document those adrift in the turbulent tides in an era of desolation.